Improved process for utilizing the sulphur-fumes from copper ores



' NITED STATES PATENT OFFICE,

ARTEMAS BIGELOW, OF NEWARK, JERSEY, ASSIGNOR TO HENRY MARTIN, OF BALTIMORE, MARYLAND.

IMPROVED PROCESS FOR UTILIZING THE SULPHUR-FUMES FROM COPPER ORES.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 95.307, dated September 28, 1869.

To all whom it may concern.-

Be it known that I, ARTEMAS BIGELOW, of the city of Newark, county of Essex, and State of New Jersey, have invented a new and useful Method ot' Utilizing the Sulphurous Acid Evolved in the Roasting, Galcining, or Smelting of Copper Ores. I hereby declare the following to be a full andk sufficient description thereof, reference being had to the accompanying drawings, and to the letters ot' reference marked thereon, making a part of this specification.

My invention consists in the application of suitable means and appliances for utilizing the sulphurous fumes that are given ott' in the process of roasting sulphurous copper ores, calcining them or smelting them in furnaces. rlhe sul phurous fumes are brought into a form having an available commercial value either by depriving them of their oxygen and retaining the sulphur or by adding another equivalent ot'oxygen, and thus converting it into sulphuric acid. The latter is the most profit-able method at present, and is the one l now ernploy; but either product can be obtained at pleasure by a suitable arrangement of the apparatns.

In the accompanying drawing A Arepresent a portion of one of the sets of roasting-kilns; B, a culvert or flue, through which the waste gases pass to the precipitating-chambers 0, where the mechanical impurities are removed by appropriate means, which, as they form the subject of another patent, need not he particularly described here. acid-chamber D, where the sulphurous acid is converted into sulphuric acid in the usual way. The other gases emerge from D through E and pass oft' through the chimney D. C is also connected by the culvert or flue H with the furnace F, in which the wasted ore is still further desulphurized by calcination.

Gr is the grate of this furnace, and I is a small chimney, through which the gases are allowed t0 escape when they are not required in C and D. From F the calcined ore is transferred to a succession of other furnaces, in which the smelting process is completed.

I have fully and successfully demonstrated From G the gases pass to the the chemical and commercial utility of my invention by practical operative tests conducted upon a full working scale and at a heavy outlay of capital. I cannot ascertain that this has ever before been done by others, and I believe that I have been the first to produce sulphuric acid on a commercial scale from the sulphur of pyritous copper ores, as hereinbefore described, and I find that important economical advantages result therefrom.

Oopper-smelting works are from obvious causes located at points where they can most readily and cheaply obtain their supply of ores and fuel. It follows, then, that any plan of transporting the ore to sulphuric-acid works and afterward to copper works for smelting would involve repeated handling and an increased amount of transportation 5 but by my plan both operations are going on at the same time, and the ore is treated, so far as sulphuricacid operations are concerned, precisely as it would be in the ordinary -courseY of coppersnielting, not the slightest additional laborer expense being incurred.

There are, besides the above, several minor advantages of an analogous character, which need not be particularly specified, but are important in the aggregate.

Having therefore demonstrated the utility of the combined operations, I desire to secure to myseltI the commercial advantage hereinbe fore set forth simply as the result from'said combination.

What I claim as my invention, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is-

The process herein described of utilizing for the production of sulphur or sulphuric acid the sulphurous-acid gas evolved from pyritous copperores during the process of converting the same into copper or copper matt or copper regulusfwhereby the two several productssulphur or sulphuric acid and copper-are manufactured in a commercial condition, substantially as described.

ARTEMAS BIGELOW.

Witnesses:

E. H. MARSDEN, L. D. SWEENEY. 

